I've been following the capacity conversation in this thread for a while. While it's clear that there has been more capacity added in the last 2 years from Paddington, there seem to be concerns that that's not being experienced by passengers.
Is this because demand has significantly increased or because the capacity is not correctly aligned to the demand (e.g. more Reading passengers than expected now cramming into fewer trains)?
If it's because demand has increased, what the railway industry do next? Paddington is at capacity in the peak and apart from reliability issues with the 80x, there's little evident room to increase the number of carriages on each service.
Demand has certainly increased significantly - and is likely to increase further, especially at the inner stations as far as Maidenhead - a glance out of the window from Ealing onwards will reveal just how many new properties are being built. Capacity is reasonably well aligned with demand, though there is certainly work that could be done to fine tune certain trains.
There has indeed been significant extra capacity added, though it is hard to fully appreciate this when standing on a 5 car unit.
I can see two ways in which further capacity could be added.
Firstly, lengthen the 9 car IETs▸ to 10 car. A 10 car unit should fit everywhere that can take a 5+5 since the length would be identical.
That is indeed the logical way forward and could add up to 2000 extra seats over the four hour period for example. However, there would need to be infrastructure work at some stations and sidings/depots so it's not just a simple case of bunging on an extra carriage.
A more radical suggestion would be to restore to use the extended platform one at Paddington, formerly used for Motorail services. That would permit of a few double length trains in the peak. 9+9 or 10+10 IETs or whatever replaces them. Fast to Taunton where the train could divide. Front portion limited stop service to Penzance, rear portion all principle stations to Plymouth would be one possibility.
A small number of double length trains, perhaps five or six in the peak two hours, would provide considerable extra capacity.
Ah. But are those extra seats going to the places where they are actually needed?
A much less likely scenario. You have to consider...
1) The cost of modification/rebuilding of the platform,
2) The risk of having only one platform available for the five or six trains - what if there's a failure.
3) IET modifications would be needed, mostly software only, but currently ten is the maximum that can operate in passenger service unless emergency rescue is taking place.
...but, most importantly...
4) If you had six departures per the peak two hours, that's a train every 20 minutes with a first stop of Taunton giving over 7500 seats - there's no way that kind of demand will ever be close to being needed for Somerset, Devon and Cornwall no matter what time of day.
Two more likely/realistic capacity boosts can be had by:
1) Removing Heathrow Express trains in the peak hours and replacing their slots with longer distance services (though where the stock comes from is a different matter, and the eastern connection to Heathrow is looming in the distance).
2) Waiting for the efficiency gains given by
ETCS▸ Level 2 in-cab signalling - also looming in the distance!
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